My current build is based around an aging P180 with sound dampening foam and some Nexus 120mm fans. It's quiet, but it's time to retire the old beast. My new system will be built around the following hardware (sound-relevant items in bold):

Case fans!I'll be swapping out the stock Define R4 fans with 2 quieter ones. Must be 140mm, low RPM, motherboard controlled. Here's my shortlist:- Phanteks PH-F140TS (chosen after favourable SPCR review)- Be Quiet Silent Wings 2 140mm- Thermalright TY-141 (I've read these are better that the TY-140s when in a vertically mounted position due to their bearing)

CPU Cooler!- Phanteks PH-TC14PE- Thermalright Silver Arrow SB-E (or SB-E Extreme), or some other Thermalright cooler - availability isn't great on these in Canada, though- Prolimatech Genesis with a set of 140mm fans from the above list- Something else? Be Quiet?

I like the idea of the Phanteks because I can have a universal set of fans in my case, all low RPM (800 or less). The same goes for Thermalright case fans + CPU cooler.

What I'm looking for is quiet operation. While gaming, I can ramp up fan speed to handle temps. But under light workload, I'd like it to be very quiet. Any advice? Thanks in advance!!

Last edited by magic_dog on Sat Aug 03, 2013 1:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

- unless you are building a DAW with a lot of VSTs, work with huge Photoshop images/layers, edit large HD movies, do 3D rendering, have a RAM disk, or some other high RAM app, you don't need 16GB. 8GB is really overkill for most builds...but reasonable for price. - If you plan to overvolt your CPU, then go for a big cooler (like you've listed). Note you've got ~170mm to work with on the R4. If you add more foam to the door, this could impact what coolers will fit. Another excellent 140mm is the Noctua NH-U14S. - If you don't plan to overvolt, a 120mm cooler will work fine. The Noctua NH-U12S, Thermalright TRUE Spirit 120M (with a replacement fan), come to mind.- case fans: try the stock ones. Might be good enough and if not, pretty simple to replace.- PSU: I like the Kingwin. Awesome idle power efficiency. - my std. Haswell caveat: In general, you might want to wait until ~September for your Haswell build. The currently released chipset has a bug in the USB3 controller, where devices sometimes aren't recognized when the PC returns from Sleep. The user fix is to dismount/remount the device for it to be recognized. Intel is releasing the fixed chipset to mobo mfgrs in end July...so it might be September when the new versions are available. If, that "feature" doesn't bother you, then no worries.

Thanks Steve! Those are good recommendations. I looked into the True Spirit 140 - an impressive cooler considering it's a single tower, single fan solution. I think I'll go with that instead of the Phanteks for better acoustics. As for timing, I'll be putting this together in November at the earliest, so I should be getting the chipsets with the USB3.0 fix.

After reading a lot of reviews, I'm weary about the stock fans for the R4. Does anyone have experience with the TY-141 (or TY-140) or the Be Quiet Silent Wings 2 140mm? How do they compare?

I'll be swapping out the stock Define R4 fans with 2 quieter ones. Must be 140mm, low RPM, motherboard controlled

Try the included fans first, this are 1000rpm 140mm fans, that can be drop down with the R4 controller to 5v, or if you prefer with FanXpert2, but the fan do go low so you might be fine with them. If you still find them not good enough after testing them, my recommendation comes from SPCR Second 140 mm Fan Roundup: Antec, bequiet!, Corsair, Scythe, while the phantek score good on the first roundup, there are two version, the one that SPCR reviewed has 4 points on the frame (v2), the more commonly sold atm is the old version (v1) with 3 points support, weather its the same or not idk, but this version was not reviewed by SPCR. In the second roundup (linked above) the antec quiet 140 did great and its cheap, so this is what i would use on R4.

magic_dog wrote:

- Thermalright TY-141 (I've read these are better that the TY-140s when in a vertically mounted position due to their bearing)

The TY141 is imo a good fan, but it not a standard 140, its weird frame (120mm mounts with 140 blades). It wont fit on the front of the R4 with screws, it can be done with zip ties, but i wouldnt bother if you have access to the antec quiet 140. Btw the TY147 is the same as the TY141 just in black/white, just in case you like something hat maches more the R4 colors.

magic_dog wrote:

- Phanteks PH-TC14PE- Thermalright Silver Arrow SB-E (or SB-E Extreme), or some other Thermalright cooler - availability isn't great on these in Canada, though- Prolimatech Genesis with a set of 140mm fans from the above list- Something else? Be Quiet?

Phantek is a great cooler, as most twin towers is expensive. I would prefer Theralright HR02 Macho out of price/performance, but searching in canada is hard to find and if found its expensive, thermalright SilverArrow SBE would be my choice for a high end cooler if were to plan to overclock, specially the new version is massive with 150mm fan, it rivals entry lvl watecooling kits, but again if you dont have access to thermlright i think phantek will do great, in some reviews against the old silver arrow it won, but i havent seen against the new 8 pipe SBE version. Another option is the Noctua NH-D14 the first twin tower cooler and still can hold its own, but it doesnt come with pwm fans, so its up to you. Just as comment its rummor that the succesor, of the NH-D14 (probably NH-D15) will be released before years end, with the A15 PWM fans, one cooler that im looking forward, so is the upcoming Thermalright HR22 which should enter production very shortly to hit retail before years end... but this are all rumors nothing confirm from the manufacturers.

magic_dog wrote:

PSU: Kingwin LZP-550 (Choice was between this and a Be Quiet! Dark Power Pro 10 550w. I liked the idea of a passive PSU below a certain temp so I chose this. If anyone here has a better ~550w recommendation, shoot)

Wonderful PSU, reviewed by SPCR and got the editors choice, i think you cant go wrong with it, even matches the R4 theme with the black n white. The only other PSU i would recommend is the totally passive Kingwin Striker 500 or Rosewill SilentNight 500, both the same PSU, as the LZP550, this is also manufactured by SuperFlower, and also both were reviewed by SPCR and got editors choice, its a very good PSU, with either you should be good.

magic_dog wrote:

Case: Fractal Design Define R4 (with extra noise dampening)

Great case, i had one come to me a couple of months ago with a dent so i didnt use it yet, but a new one is coming in couple of weeks. I like a lot its plain laid back style, the only thing i wished different is they should design the fans to mount to the chassis, i find inconvinient the extra plastic thing, specially to have to move it to take the fan filter, i like more the design of the ARC MIDI 2 for the frontal found monting and easy of removal of the frontal fan, this is just me nitpicking, the R4 is great though. Btw if you are not going with mechancial or need much space you could also go micro ATX with something like Silverstone TJ08-E / PS07.

magic_dog wrote:

RAM: Crucial Ballistix 16gb

Just as a recommendation, i personally like Crucial memory, but they have a Ballistix sport super low profile, very nice memory, specially for someone looking to install a twin tower cooler like the phanteks, so if you can go for it, its the same price, and it should give you greater flexibility on whatever cooler you chose and upgrade down the road. I bought this expecting the NH-D15 that i might try down the road if i move back to ATX with an R4 and sli for a 4k monitor =)

Almost everything has been said before, just to reiterate some points:Great built.Listen to the R4's fans before you replace them.Unless you want the maximum overclock o nair you don't need a cooler with two fans, the Thermalright Macho, True Spirit or Scythe Mugen 3 (where available) will be fine.16GB of are overkill in most cases, the only downside is cost. I wouldn't go lower than 8GB.I would upgrade from the Asus Z87-PLUS to the Z87-PRO for the additional usable (with dual slot graphics) PCIe slot and Wifi. You should wait for chipset revision C2, Asus boards are already available with it (where I live), make sure to get it.

I agree. If you plan to run the supplied Fractal Design 140s under motherboard control, then with an Asus board the best option is to select the Silent option in the BIOS.

With a three pin fan this will give a thermally controlled range of between 7 and 12 volts (60 to 100%). The actual speeds you could expect from the R4 140mm fan are at 7V - 705 rpm, 9V - 900 rpm and 12V - 1050 rpm. If you use the R4's built-in fan controller you can drop the speed even further, to 495 rpm at 5V. What might be worth considering is using the fan controller to run the front fan at 5V, and using motherboard control for the exhaust fan. This will minimise the fan noise at idle, but under load any additional fan noise will only come from the exhaust so will make less impact overall. A thermally controlled exhaust fan will also help to keep down the rpm of the cooler fan(s). Couple this with the Asus Silent profile, which typically holds the fan speed down to the minimum level until CPU temperature hits around 40C and you would have a quiet system without the need to replace fans.

If you deploy the Asus Fan Xpert 2 software this will give you an additional option for fan control. This is that you could plug the front fan into the motherboard and set it under software control to not run until a specified CPU temperature was reached, for example 50C leaving only the rear fan running under normal conditions. However if even this setup would not be quiet enough for you then replacing the rear fan or maybe both would have to be the option.

Since the supplied fans can run from around 700 rpm any replacements would probably have to be well below this speed to be worth the investment. This would eliminate the Thermalright TY-141 from your list because this fan does not go much under 700 rpm in any configuration. Of the remaining choices, you might consider the Be Quiet 140mm Silent Wings 2 PWM fan. Your choice of motherboard is one which has a CPU PWM fan header and also a CPU_OPT PWM fan header. The CPU_OPT allows for either two CPU fans without needing a PWM splitter cable or for running a PWM exhaust fan in tandem with CPU fan control. So the Silent Wings 2 PWM as an exhaust would simply be a plug-in choice if the CPU cooler is single fan. If you adopt the Asus BIOS Silent profile for CPU fan control this gives a wider control range than the motherboard headers, from 20 to 100%. And again it will hold the fan speed down to minimal levels until the CPU hits at least 40C. Using the Silent Wings 2 PWM as the exhaust fan would give speeds in the region of 350 to 1000 rpm. How low the speed would actually be would depend on all the factors affecting how hot the CPU gets, both loading and ambient temperature. But the system would be quieter this way than anything that could be achieved using the 3 pin Fractal fans. Replacing the front fan with a PWM fan would require a splitter cable and possibly a PWM extension cable as well.

If the preference is for Phanteks then the issue might be how low these will go under PWM control. The other fans that drop as low as the Be Quiet 140mm PWM would include some of the Scythe Glide Stream or Slip Stream models, which currently seem hard to get in North America. The Noctua NF-A15 PWM could be considered as this has a 300 to 1200 rpm range (20 to 100% duty cycle). It does come with rubber mountings, a PWM splitter cable, PWM extension cable and low noise adapter which will limit top speed to around 900 rpm. These extras help compensate for the premium price.

Just as a recommendation, i personally like Crucial memory, but they have a Ballistix sport super low profile

Exactly the RAM I'm getting (actually, the tactical LP model with lower timings). My reason for 16gb of RAM is to reduce writing to the SSD, and for the occasional heavy workload. An SSD and lots of RAM makes video editing a lot easier. The LP model should clear the wider towers.

After reading more reviews, I'm very impressed with the True Spirit 140. Getting that is a good opportunity to get rid of an extra fan in my setup (as opposed to a dual tower cooler). For now I think this is the cooler I'll end up getting.

boost wrote:

I would upgrade from the Asus Z87-PLUS to the Z87-PRO for the additional usable (with dual slot graphics) PCIe slot and Wifi.

Well... I was going to, but I never use Crossfire / SLI, don't intend to, and the wireless isn't the new 802.11ac spec. For now I would rather cheap out a bit and if I need wifi in the future, I'll get a wireless ac card. I guess the new SATA spec will be over PCIe, but since neither board is SATA Express 'certified', this doesn't really matter.

lodestar wrote:

The CPU_OPT allows for either two CPU fans without needing a PWM splitter cable or for running a PWM exhaust fan in tandem with CPU fan control. So the Silent Wings 2 PWM as an exhaust would simply be a plug-in choice if the CPU cooler is single fan. If you adopt the Asus BIOS Silent profile for CPU fan control this gives a wider control range than the motherboard headers, from 20 to 100%. And again it will hold the fan speed down to minimal levels until the CPU hits at least 40C.

That's a really good point, I never thought of that. Is there a big difference between the PWM control vs. the voltage control? From what I understand the CPU headers are PWM and the case fan headers are voltage only.

I think I'll give the R4's fans a listen as suggested, if I want something a bit quieter I may opt for the Antec TrueQuiet 140s. They're easier to obtain in Canada (cheaper too). Does anyone here have experience with it?

Well... I was going to, but I never use Crossfire / SLI, don't intend to, and the wireless isn't the new 802.11ac spec. For now I would rather cheap out a bit and if I need wifi in the future, I'll get a wireless ac card. I guess the new SATA spec will be over PCIe, but since neither board is SATA Express 'certified', this doesn't really matter.

If you use wifi ac the integrated USB solution on this board is not adequate. You need PCIe (or mini PCIe) for full speed.SATA Express just sends one PCIe Link and one or two PCIe lanes over one port (two SATA ports for two lanes or M.2 interface for laptops) that looks like SATA and is backwards compatible with sata.

magic_dog wrote:

That's a really good point, I never thought of that. Is there a big difference between the PWM control vs. the voltage control? From what I understand the CPU headers are PWM and the case fan headers are voltage only.

Yes there is, but with your build it can be simple. The Fractal R4 has a fan controller that can supply 12V, 7V or 5V to the case fans. If they are too loud for you at 12V try 7V. At 5V they don't much much air, which is ok until you add a graphics card.The CPU cooler's fan can be controlled from the PWM CPU header on the mainboard.

After reading a lot of reviews, I'm weary about the stock fans for the R4.

Are these the 1000mm FDB fans? I just got two of these off the bay and had a quick listen outside the case - sound pretty decent to me, that is I can barely hear them at ~7V from ~half a meter distance. I'd also wager you should test them first.

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